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Shame and animal ethics: on moral shame’s critical functions regarding human-animal issues
Thomas Kainberger
Herwig Grimm
Jes Lynning Harfeld
Master thesis - University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna - 2023
Recently, there has been a renewed interest in the moral function of emotions within the field of ethics. Shame features prominently among the emotions that theorists have paid particular attention to. Sometimes characterized as a Jekyll-and-Hyde emotion, it tends to be endorsed or rejected as a moral emotion, depending on which of its faces is seen as having more significance. While its positive side suggests that it is a valuable moral emotion, its negative side suggests that it runs contrary to morality. Those who endorse a pessimistic view of shame point out, for example, that the experience of shame causes self-destructive behaviour and damaging forms of suffering. Furthermore, as the practice of public shaming has increased in popularity, the question of whether shaming others can be justified has gained new relevance. Not only might the practice of shaming be shameless but evoking shame might also turn out to be counterproductive, particularly when shame is (taken to be) obsessed with the “self” instead of moral principles or values. Consequently, some proponents of a pessimistic view argue that the morally progressive way to deal with shame - both individually and socially is to overcome it. In contrast to this view, I defend the positive face of shame. Against the idea of shame standing to our disposal I argue that getting rid of it is not a possibility in the first place. Engaging with Sartre, Levinas and Agamben, I show that shame is an essential mark of subjectivity. Moreover, as I will propose with a view on animal ethics, there is moral value attached to shame, when it experientially represents to the subject its implication in a shameful or morally deficient state of the world, while it lacks moral value, when it blames the subject in abstraction from the fact of being so implicated. Shame has moral value in this sense, when the shamefulness giving rise to it is recognized to be a feature not of the subject qua person, but of the normative infrastructure the latter is subjected to. In this view, while shaming another person is wrong, Shame’s value in the field of animal ethics might consist in its critical potential with regards to the norms that regulate our consumption of animals.
Masterarbeit - Veterinärmedizinische Universität Wien - 2023
Englisch
2023
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